Improved Hordes [V1.0]

[-Holo-]

Does the pathing of the horde target a player and hold on it?

We have had this mod active for a while now while playing, and it's been absolutely great to random run into a horde walking past while out looting every so often.

But recently it seems to always come straight to the small outposts we build and just run back and forth until they detect us.  Making it extremely tedious and boring when it's something you can count on happening twice a night.

 

[FilUnderscore]

Does the pathing of the horde target a player and hold on it?

We have had this mod active for a while now while playing, and it's been absolutely great to random run into a horde walking past while out looting every so often.

But recently it seems to always come straight to the small outposts we build and just run back and forth until they detect us.  Making it extremely tedious and boring when it's something you can count on happening twice a night.

Are you generating lots of heat at these outposts, e.g. sounds, forges, etc? That could be attracting the hordes as attraction distance at high heat levels (>80%) is a few hundred blocks (dependent on world size). Hordes only hold target on players as long as they can see/hear you nearby, otherwise they will quickly stop pursuing you after a short time.

 

[-Holo-]

Are you generating lots of heat at these outposts, e.g. sounds, forges, etc? That could be attracting the hordes as attraction distance at high heat levels (>80%) is a few hundred blocks (dependent on world size). Hordes only hold target on players as long as they can see/hear you nearby, otherwise they will quickly stop pursuing you after a short time.

Not much heat at all really, one of the outposts was a fresh new POI we took over, an older firestation, we had built a campfire but it was not used since we hadn't found cookingpot/grill, and we hadn't done much constuction either, just sitting inside at night stealthed when we heard z's roaring about. sneaking up on the roof (nightvision goggles to the rescue) we watched the horde running back and forth until they somehow detects us.
This behaviour we have seen on some other outposts aswell, horde comes running kinda straight at the base and running back and forth outside until they detect us. Usually twice a night.

Would it be possible to tweak the behavior of the horde in the future you think?

Ideally for my taste, I'd like to run across hordes wandering the world , not necessarily targeting a player since I'm fed up with how 'gamy' the world has become.
 

 

[FilUnderscore]

Not much heat at all really, one of the outposts was a fresh new POI we took over, an older firestation, we had built a campfire but it was not used since we hadn't found cookingpot/grill, and we hadn't done much constuction either, just sitting inside at night stealthed when we heard z's roaring about. sneaking up on the roof (nightvision goggles to the rescue) we watched the horde running back and forth until they somehow detects us.
This behaviour we have seen on some other outposts aswell, horde comes running kinda straight at the base and running back and forth outside until they detect us. Usually twice a night.

Would it be possible to tweak the behavior of the horde in the future you think?

Ideally for my taste, I'd like to run across hordes wandering the world , not necessarily targeting a player since I'm fed up with how 'gamy' the world has become.
 

Just checking, you are running the latest version released a few days (2.0.0-beta.5)? There have been tweaks to AI between different versions, however it might not be 100% perfect yet. This sounds like it was an issue some were experiencing in slightly older builds as well.

Regarding tweaking horde behavior in the future, I am looking into ways to allow complete customization of horde AI through configuration. It's a challenge to put it into an intuitive config format with how it's currently handled in the code and there are still a few bugs in the current build that I'm ironing out.

If you are running the latest version, I would be happy to take a deeper look into what could be causing the AI to act like that. You could try setting "event_chunk_radius" to 0 and see if that affects anything (it should disable the horde heatmap detection).

 

[-Holo-]

Just checking, you are running the latest version released a few days (2.0.0-beta.5)? There have been tweaks to AI between different versions, however it might not be 100% perfect yet. This sounds like it was an issue some were experiencing in slightly older builds as well.

Regarding tweaking horde behavior in the future, I am looking into ways to allow complete customization of horde AI through configuration. It's a challenge to put it into an intuitive config format with how it's currently handled in the code and there are still a few bugs in the current build that I'm ironing out.

If you are running the latest version, I would be happy to take a deeper look into what could be causing the AI to act like that. You could try setting "event_chunk_radius" to 0 and see if that affects anything (it should disable the horde heatmap detection).

Hm. Think it might have a been a earlier version then, updated yesterday( I think) and havent been to the outposts to check. will take a look and update with results!

I can imagine it being a nightmare to get to work, never looked into dll modding though, just having a hardtime with regular xpath edits to customize the game to our tastes

 

[Agame]

I have noticed similar to above, whenever I go back to my base there is always a couple of hordes in or around it, and this is even when I have nothing 'running' in the base like a forge while I am away. I have a very minimal base as I play semi nomadic, but I still need somewhere to craft stuff. Its like the AI is just attracted to your base location regardless.

Its annoying as I have been playing with VERY large hordes as I love to see them roaming the map, having to dodge around them or even abandon looting a POI when they show up. But having to wade through hundreds of Z every time I go back to base is tiring.

Playing latest version also.

 

[Agame]

Related question, is this section the main way the hordes interact with heat:

<!-- Events -->
    <event_chunk_radius>3</event_chunk_radius>
    <event_interest_distance_multiplier>0.5</event_interest_distance_multiplier>

I assume lowering that would make them less likely to pile in on the base?

 

[FilUnderscore]

Related question, is this section the main way the hordes interact with heat:

<!-- Events -->
    <event_chunk_radius>3</event_chunk_radius>
    <event_interest_distance_multiplier>0.5</event_interest_distance_multiplier>

I assume lowering that would make them less likely to pile in on the base?

Should do, the second setting affects the attraction distance as a multiplier. I'll need to do some more testing with the AI.

 

[Agame]

Ok, update, I reset everything back to default and played about a week (in game), and its almost the opposite problem, not seeing enough hordes.

So I think its either somehow the extreme numbers I set for the hordes changed the behaviour or possibly I had some other settings I had changed and forgot about, either way you should possibly ignore my previous comments!

But I am going to keep testing and experimenting with the settings as I have a specific style I would like to get working for the mod.

 

[-Holo-]

Update from here too!
set the chunk event radius to 0, and seems like it was indeed "heathordes" that came several times a night.

Rarely seeing any hordes now though at all when out and about, only seen one large that kinda popped in standing downtown, and stayed there standing around (?)

Does the mod change spawning of regular zombies or screamers in the world?

 

[Agame]

Is there a toggle for 'feral senses' on the hordes? I thought there was in a previous version, or do they just use the global setting when you start a game?

 

[FilUnderscore]

Update from here too!
set the chunk event radius to 0, and seems like it was indeed "heathordes" that came several times a night.

Rarely seeing any hordes now though at all when out and about, only seen one large that kinda popped in standing downtown, and stayed there standing around (?)

Does the mod change spawning of regular zombies or screamers in the world?

Nope, mod doesn't touch any vanilla spawns (and screamer spawns were reverted in the latest update). Could feel like this because of the distance that heat attracts hordes from. Have you tried tinkering with the event_interest_distance_multiplier and maybe going 0.1 or 0.25 to reduce the heat range while keeping chunk_event_radius at 3?

Also how are the other biomes faring, have you been to harder difficulty biomes as they have more hordes active?

Is there a toggle for 'feral senses' on the hordes? I thought there was in a previous version, or do they just use the global setting when you start a game?

There was a toggle for the new AI sensing which was removed as it's now always active, though I am still looking to amplify their senses if you've got feral sense on.

The issue with balancing is trying to get it feeling "just right", and what feels right for one person might not for another. That's what I'm trying to bridge by having the settings and specifics be easily tweakable, but it's still hard to test unless you play for hours on end.

 

[Agame]

The issue with balancing is trying to get it feeling "just right", and what feels right for one person might not for another. That's what I'm trying to bridge by having the settings and specifics be easily tweakable, but it's still hard to test unless you play for hours on end.

Yes I can see balancing is a nightmare, so much randomness depending on player movement vs what the hordes are doing, you would probably need 50 - 100 people all testing it at the same time to really get a good idea.

And you are right that its hard to balance for the audience as I think people are using this for very different reasons, some people just want a small bump in hordes for a little extra spice in gameplay, and some people want to use the mod as an alternative to horde night as a real end game threat. So I wonder if it is possible to create an option/menu screen that you could give people some selections for the mod? Or possibly that is way to difficult to implement.

 

[-Holo-]

Nope, mod doesn't touch any vanilla spawns (and screamer spawns were reverted in the latest update). Could feel like this because of the distance that heat attracts hordes from. Have you tried tinkering with the event_interest_distance_multiplier and maybe going 0.1 or 0.25 to reduce the heat range while keeping chunk_event_radius at 3?

Also how are the other biomes faring, have you been to harder difficulty biomes as they have more hordes active?

There was a toggle for the new AI sensing which was removed as it's now always active, though I am still looking to amplify their senses if you've got feral sense on.

The issue with balancing is trying to get it feeling "just right", and what feels right for one person might not for another. That's what I'm trying to bridge by having the settings and specifics be easily tweakable, but it's still hard to test unless you play for hours on end.

Haven't tested with event_interest multiplier, but went out to the desert and had a blast!

a quite large horde came running quite close to base, after dispatching it screamers took notice and came looking, and for once, summoned in a buttload of more zombies, including more screamers. It was glorious!

Having weird issues with a severe lack of zombies spawning overall though that i'm trying to figure out currently.

 

[Agame]

Haven't tested with event_interest multiplier, but went out to the desert and had a blast!

a quite large horde came running quite close to base, after dispatching it screamers took notice and came looking, and for once, summoned in a buttload of more zombies, including more screamers. It was glorious!

Having weird issues with a severe lack of zombies spawning overall though that i'm trying to figure out currently.

My favourite experience is when I am in the middle of exploring a POI and a massive horde shows up, it suddenly becomes a mini horde night in a random POI and you have to get creative to survive! It creates the kind of tension that is completely lacking from Vanilla bloodmoon, that is so predictable and mundane. 

 

[-Holo-]

My favourite experience is when I am in the middle of exploring a POI and a massive horde shows up, it suddenly becomes a mini horde night in a random POI and you have to get creative to survive! It creates the kind of tension that is completely lacking from Vanilla bloodmoon, that is so predictable and mundane. 

Yeah. Had a fun experience looting a basement in a building when I heard a larger-then-normal commotion, and looked out some cellarwindows and saw legs! everywhere.
Suddenly it turned into a mad chase to not get boxed in the cellar

The Bloodmoon nights we have disabled at the server, they just don't fill any purpose anymore

 

[FilUnderscore]

So I wonder if it is possible to create an option/menu screen that you could give people some selections for the mod? Or possibly that is way to difficult to implement.

There is an integration with my other mod, Mod Manager, which pretty much allows that to be done in a specific mod settings tab. It existed in the first version of Improved Hordes, however I've rewritten the mod since then and haven't re-implemented support yet. The stable version should support UI settings (with Mod Manager) when it comes out.

Haven't tested with event_interest multiplier, but went out to the desert and had a blast!

a quite large horde came running quite close to base, after dispatching it screamers took notice and came looking, and for once, summoned in a buttload of more zombies, including more screamers. It was glorious!

Having weird issues with a severe lack of zombies spawning overall though that i'm trying to figure out currently.

The pine forest by default has much less hordes roaming about, but as you go to harder biomes you get more and more. Fun awaits in the wasteland!

Regarding zombie spawning, consider looking at max_spawn_capacity_percent in the settings and lowering that number to allow more non-horde zombies to spawn if you're finding they are hitting the spawn limit, or alternatively increase your MaxSpawnedZombies game setting.

 

[-Holo-]

There is an integration with my other mod, Mod Manager, which pretty much allows that to be done in a specific mod settings tab. It existed in the first version of Improved Hordes, however I've rewritten the mod since then and haven't re-implemented support yet. The stable version should support UI settings (with Mod Manager) when it comes out.





The pine forest by default has much less hordes roaming about, but as you go to harder biomes you get more and more. Fun awaits in the wasteland!

Regarding zombie spawning, consider looking at max_spawn_capacity_percent in the settings and lowering that number to allow more non-horde zombies to spawn if you're finding they are hitting the spawn limit, or alternatively increase your MaxSpawnedZombies game setting.

I set the MaxSpawnedZombies to 5120 to test if anything like that was effing about, but no change running around downtown districts but rarely even seeing a zombie out and about

Would it be possible from a debug standpoint to put one of the dot sprites or something  atop your mods zombieshead to differntiate from regular zombies?
I modded up spawning xml from khaines dangerous cities to a large increase and slower respawntime, a bunch of zombies were around for first start, but after a while it's back to normal and no zombies in this zombie game.
 

 

[FilUnderscore]

I set the MaxSpawnedZombies to 5120 to test if anything like that was effing about, but no change running around downtown districts but rarely even seeing a zombie out and about

Would it be possible from a debug standpoint to put one of the dot sprites or something  atop your mods zombieshead to differntiate from regular zombies?
I modded up spawning xml from khaines dangerous cities to a large increase and slower respawntime, a bunch of zombies were around for first start, but after a while it's back to normal and no zombies in this zombie game.

I've got map markers on zombies spawned by the mod in the debug builds, but I'm not sure it would really help since you've got the issue of no zombies spawning instead of lagging out (which you would if there are thousands of zombies spawned).

Are there any other entities popping up when you type the "le" command in the console? Does it still happen without Improved Hordes?

 

[-Holo-]

I've got map markers on zombies spawned by the mod in the debug builds, but I'm not sure it would really help since you've got the issue of no zombies spawning instead of lagging out (which you would if there are thousands of zombies spawned).

Are there any other entities popping up when you type the "le" command in the console? Does it still happen without Improved Hordes?

There's generally only less then 10 zombies active, and about the same entities (Even with two players on different part of the map (I'm checking the dedicated server window often (out of frustration ))), I'll check tomorrow with IH disabled, but I'm fairly sure it's the same problem,  I just figured it would be helpful for situations like this to know if it's vanilla spawns or IH zombies you encounter